Parts Therapy: For Habits Conflicts & Decisions

Many of the problems people face are created by conflicting motivation-driven behaviors of the individual. The human mind is complex and deep and it is quite possible for different aspects of a person to feel two different ways about a situation. Have you ever found it difficult to choose between two alternatives?

Perhaps you had to choose between going to the movies and finishing a report that was due. The movie might seem like more fun, but being finished with the report would help you to relax more.

One way of looking at this is that two internal aspects of your personality are in conflict. And what about the person who wants to break a habit or achieve some goal? Perhaps they smoke to relax. Perhaps they’d like to stop smoking in order to have more energy and vitality. Maybe they would like to exercise to get the feeling of pride, but even the thought of exercising seems so tiring.

In order to get multiple aspects of our personalities congruently working toward one goal, it is useful to help them see that they can accomplish more by working together than they can by fighting each other. That’s the first part of what integrative techniques do.